


Deja Vu

by windandthestars



Category: Sanctuary (TV)
Genre: Community: hc_bingo, F/M, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-30
Updated: 2011-12-30
Packaged: 2017-10-30 02:23:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/326733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/windandthestars/pseuds/windandthestars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She knows Will feels it too, although she knows he can't remember, not the way she can.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Deja Vu

**Author's Note:**

> Angst. Minor character death. Spoilers for Will's backstory and general s4. For hc_bingo (death).

Damp foggy rain, grey clouds. It's bitterly cold and the air smells faintly of blood, fear, and dirt kicked up from the pavement, debris. It's the mental list that never stops and then, for a moment, the world around her fades away; she's not here in a damp narrow alley way, but in a clearing under a tree moonlight dashed over the tattered bones of a tent, an unmoving body. The child in her arms shivers and she pulls him closer, tugging her jacket around them both as best she can.

There's chaos off to her left where the alley dead ends, but she's deaf to it now, tiny whimpers and sniffles garnering all of her attention.

"You're alright." She whispers. "You're safe now."

More tears bleed through her blouse and leave her skin prickling as the late fall wind picks up again.

"Doc," it's Kate, she needs directions, instructions, some indication of how to carry on. There's more life to be preserved, a wounded creature. This is her job. Declan's voice rumbles through her, the wind carrying his short response and Helen shakes her head just enough to filter it all back out, keep the noise from working it’s way in. It's all to familiar. It's almost the same as that night.

She knows Will feels it too, although she knows he can't remember, not the way she can. The trauma had robbed him of most of his memories from that night but she remembers, she remembers every excruciating detail. He's been watching her, two paces back toward the mouth of the ally since they had subdued the creature and she had wrapped the child in her embrace. Neither of them had moved; neither had breathed a word. She can't bring herself to meet his eye, but she knows; she can feel him there waiting for her reply. He's always waiting.

She tips her face down, chin brushing against a black beanie and murmurs in long practiced, low soothing tones. This poor child, this half-frozen scrap of a boy, had lost the only person that truly cared for him. Helen could watch over him, make sure he found a good family, someone to love him, but it would never be the same. It never could be, not when the story she would tell him, coax him through, the story the police would hear, it would all be a lie.

It's that more than anything that leaves that an empty ache inside her, the inevitable lie. Perhaps when this was over, when the mess with Addison had been dealt with and long forgotten she could confide this in Will, explain it, explain this feeling. He would never agree with her reasoning, certainly not now, and perhaps not later either, but she was hoping he would understand in some way. She needed him to. She needed him to understand that she only ever lied, stretched or hid the truth, to protect the people, the creatures, that she cared about, that she loved.


End file.
